Rewarding Faith:

      "From Selfishness to Righteousness"

 

 

 

For men will be lovers of “themselves” lovers of money, boasters, proud, blasphemers, disobedient, unthankful, unholy etc. 2 Timothy 3:2.

 

And especially those who walk according to the flesh in the lust of uncleanness and despise authority. They are presumptuous, “self willed” and not afraid to speak evil --- 2 Peter 2:10.

 

Meet a man who walked according to the flesh. An original man of sin. For no one knows us like we know ourselves. We have all sinned and come short of the glory of God. Romans 3:23.

 

I was presumptuous, over stepping my bounds, taking liberties, and overly aggressive. Self-willed and taking offense at every turn. Look at me sideways and you would get a hot blast of the most vile curse words any man had ever spoken.

 

Yet looking for love in all the wrong places. Never hearing any good news from one year to the next. But it was out there waiting for just a touch of selfishness to subside long enough for truth to penetrate the wall of self-will.

 

God knows the heart of man and He will move on that ones behalf that gives the slightest hint that he’s had enough of selfishness and desires something more.

 

How can we possibly love the things of the world? Only a god of deceit could ever hope to persuade us that the temporal world is true reality. There is no one who does good for mans goodness is as filthy rags. Isaiah 64:6.

 

A man named Paul was convinced of his righteousness even to the act of murder. In teaching the Philippians he says this, “If anyone else thinks he may have confidence in the flesh, I more so.” He goes on to brag about his lineage, being from the tribe of Benjamin, a Hebrew of the Hebrews, very zealous in persecuting the church, and according to the law, blameless.

                                                                                                                      If there ever was a man who could be saved by works alone it was Paul. If there ever was a man who needed his mind renewed it was Paul. He found out very suddenly one day on the road to Damascus how righteous he really was. His acts were not those of righteousness but of persecution.

 

In Philippians 3:9 he testifies thus, “That I may gain Christ and be found in him, not having my own righteousness which is from the law, but that which is through faith in Christ, the righteousness which is from God through faith.”

 

I never knew about righteousness, I’d heard the word in the world but only from the negative side, such as, “that person is so self righteous.”

 

I came to find out that becoming righteous is not obtained by performing acts of goodness. Goodness is not possible outside of the life of God. Jesus said, “No one is good but God.” Matthew 19:17.

 

To be completely literal and scriptural there is no such thing as self righteousness. Just as Paul stated in Romans 3:10, there is none righteous no not one. Then in verse 12 he says, there is none who does good.

 

So we see that of all the people who have lived and died since Adam there was no one who could be called righteous on their own. Apart from personal faith in Gods word there can be no righteousness.

 

What exactly does it mean? It simply means being in right standing with God or being right with God.

 

How does a man get right with God?

 

First of all we need an understanding of the situation in which we were born into. We were born into sin, which is unrighteousness.

 

Within the world system there is the kingdom of darkness and the kingdom of light. All men are born physically into the kingdom of darkness, he doesn’t know it at birth but eventually he will as he gets older. He will begin to do things that he knows are wrong but he cannot help himself. He takes on selfishness as a garment and wears it proudly all the days of his life unless he comes to God and begins to train himself through the word how to put on newness of life.

 

Selfishness is a by-product of the fruit of carnal love (Phileo). This kind of love has its foundation in selfishness. Me, my and mine are most important to the carnal man. He will spend his whole life defending his possessions which include his family, his home, his automobile etc. All of this seems to be the normal way of everyday life. Another practice in today’s society is to leave ones current wife and family and to take up with another person of the same or opposite sex and begin again which is surely a complete act of selfishness.

 

Taking offense is another fruit of carnal love. Man today is offended by everything. You can’t look at someone the wrong way or they immediately become offended. There is a personal defense in the world today that says, “Who do you think you are treating me this way?”

                                                                                                          Natural, carnal love has many fruits and all of it is produced through the kingdom of darkness.

 

On the other hand we have the God kind of love (Agape) that comes forth from the kingdom of light who is Jesus the Christ. This is true spiritual love that gives and never takes. For God so loved the world that He gave. John 3:16.

 

Through Jesus of Nazareth the world first began to get a glimpse of Gods love, as the Lord showed by example how God the Father had meant for man to act on the earth. All that Jesus said and did was done to please the Father. The people that traveled with Him stayed for a reason and that was the love of God manifesting itself in and through Him everywhere He went.

 

Jesus of Nazareth was God in the flesh but more than that He Himself proclaimed to be the word of life, the eternal word that was present at the beginning of creation. This eternal word is what He came to share and all that He did in the natural was used to get mans attention, once He had their attention then He taught them eternal truth which is His word.

 

Today the world is getting away from the word of God and replacing it with humanistic values and thoughts. These things are in themselves products of unrighteousness. They are born in the heart of Satan and handed to the one whom he has prepared to accept them. Even believers today are teaching humanism and their messages are being passed on as truth but in fact there is no truth in them.

 

Only the word of God is truth and when we discard the life in the word for something that sounds right then we have no life in us to speak of. Then we are easily snared by Satan’s deceptions just like Eve in the garden.

 

To walk in righteousness is to walk in the word; to walk in the word is to be obedient and to be obedient is pleasing to the Father. What earthly father who is walking in the light is not pleased when his son chooses to do the same?

 

What does it profit a man if he gains the whole world and loses his soul? Mark 8:36. A man with a lost soul is a man that’s been deceived by Satan and he is travelling the road of least resistance. Meaning that everything in his life seems fine, he is prosperous in the eyes of the world, he is good in his own sight and he follows the familiar path of eat, drink and be merry for tomorrow you may die.

 

Now and then he may consider eternity but he dismisses the thought as an intruder and says to himself, nothing can interfere with my life style, I have it all and I’ve done it by myself.

 

His worldly title is surely “The Self Made Man.”

 

All at once he reaches the age of 50; he begins to realize that all of his bad habits are catching up with him. He looks in the mirror and he is 40 pounds over weight, most of his wavy hair is gone, he needs alcohol to get him through the day and life is not exciting anymore. He is without hope and without God in the world. Ephesians 2:12.

 

There is only one hope for the self made man and it is wrapped up in this eternal word, whosoever shall call on the name of the Lord (Jesus) shall be saved. Acts 2:21.The literal meaning of saved is to be set free from the temporary evils of this world. In all honesty if any man would just stop and consider just how empty and temporary this world actually is I’m sure they would agree that eternal life is far better.

 

Eternal life consists of being born from above, receiving right standing with God and an on going deliverance which includes redemption for the flesh that takes place in the twinkling of an eye at Christ’s appearing. 1 Corinthians 15:52.

 

The word says that when we see Him we shall be like Him for we shall see Him as He is.

 

He is the redeemer, the one who paid the price, the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world. John 1:29.

 

The selfishness of the self made man comes to nothing for it shall be burned with fervent heat along with all other unrighteousness and iniquity and will eventually be cast into the lake of fire. Revelation 21:8.

 

Let us put off our own selfishness and learn to walk as the righteousness of God in Christ Jesus for He is the only truth and he earned the right to be the author and finisher of our faith.         Hebrews 12:2.

 

Written by: R W Nagle.